Brendan Rodgers has slammed Wesley Fofana’s agents - but insisted they won’t drive a wedge between him and the player.
Leicester's boss was stunned after being outed on the French defender’s instagram account for ‘exposing’ him. He wrote: ‘Thanks to the managers - to the coach who has always appreciated me, even if he chose to expose me a lot lately - I got it coach.”
But the Foxes’ chief refused to get involved in a war of words with Chelsea’s new £80m signing and instead aimed at a different target. He said: "I never get too emotional with words. If you look at the logic of it, Wesley was exposed here to a club when very few people knew who he was.
“We bought him here as a 19-year-old, put him in the team, his profile went worldwide - as a kid - and he was absolutely brilliant. He got injured, the club could have been exposed but they looked after him and gave him a great new contract. His agents would have done well out of that, as well. And we felt he was going to be here. I felt he wanted to be here. But the game has changed. I would say the post hasn’t come from Wesley.
“I know that for sure because I’ve had other experiences of it where I had message from him that just hadn’t come from him. So the post was probably a cheap shot towards the end from representatives other than him. The kid’s a great lad. I’m not going to sit here - he was brilliant for me - and I’m not happy because he’s left because we’ve lost a top player but I’m not going to destroy a young guy whose 21 years old because he gave me everything. I know where the messages have come from.”
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Fofana’s capture by Chelsea raised a few eyebrows when he was unveiled after joining the Foxes for £36.5m just under two years ago. But he quickly flourished under Rodgers and clearly the bond between them remains. He said: “I’ll speak to him at some point. Our relationship was very strong. I think he’s said in some interviews I was a father figure for him. I’ve strong relationship with him, come off the streets onto this stage and he was brilliant for us.”
